When DARPA calls… again?!

Once in a blue moon, once in a lifetime, a golden opportunity. sometimes it’s hard to put into words just how lucky you can truly be. Sometimes things just align right and looking back you can see all the little waves you made that, over time, built into something amazing. It’s been what feels like a lifetime since I started my education and for awhile it felt like I was going to go by unnoticed, average. No one wants to be average, but by definition so many of us are. For me, I just feel like I need to be more. But no matter how hard I worked, the ripples just didn’t amount to much… until they did and now, well maybe we should start at the beginning.

Hi, for those who don’t know, or don’t remember (I don’t blame you, it’s been awhile), I’m a 5th year PhD candidate who is just a few short month…?! (okay like 6 weeks, but who’s counting?!) away from FINALLY having my doctorate in neuroengineering, if all goes well anyway . I have my BS and MS in mechanical engineering and it was a HARD transition. Just because they both have engineering in the name doesn’t make them the same thing. Trust me on that. It’s been a long, hard journey that involved everything from a suicide attempt to homelessness, to somehow making it here. I took a full-time job at the hospital I was doing my research at, yes while still finishing my degree and it’s been hard, but I think it’s been worth it.

It’s hard to summarize the last (roughly) 15 years, but I left the military for medical reasons. A nice way to say that I was dumped due to injury, but that’s how it goes. Once I stopped feeling sorry for myself, I decided I wanted to build prosthetics for a living, which led to a call to a DARPA program manager, Dr. Ling. I’ve shared my Dr. Ling story so many times now, but basically he called me back and gave me some advice. The advice was essentially go to school, do research, and go from there. Which was basic, almost painfully obvious advice, but at the time it was the nudge in the right direction that I needed.

Undergrad took almost ten, long and painful, years. It was a lot and I nearly didn’t make it, but as is the theme, I got lucky. Found people who helped me keep going, despite maybe not exactly deserving it. I mean on paper I was, at one point, a less than stellar student mostly caused by my one time nearly dead suicide attempt (as opposed to the other times where it wasn’t such a close call). I’m not shy about sharing my failures and it was a failure that started the 365 days of academia project (four years strong, despite the semi-bad finish).

Still, I finished my BS, got my MS in a year, and moved across the country to do my PhD! I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it (probably dozens of times), but I started class the next day after I had moved into a house without actually seeing the home in person prior to purchasing it. Oh and I had just traveled from Paris to Bristol all before moving (like got off the plane, packed, moved, started class, and it was just that fast).

All that buildup to summarize the last two years or so. Which are simply, a grant I wrote was funded (here), they did an interview (here), and then DARPA found me this time (here). Once again it really feels like it went just that quickly, one thing right after the other. BUT IT GETS BETTER! So I go to the Risers event (here), and I am one of five who are selected to talk about my work in front of all the people (including DARPA staff). After 15 years FINALLY got to tell Dr. Ling thank you (here), and even just typing that makes me tear up and I say that quite literally.

And I thought that was it. That was the thing I was going to hang my hat on, I had peaked.

It’s been an odd six or so months partly because I’m still working towards a goal (or several), but I feel like I’ve done it all. A goal that takes that long, well it feels weird not having that thing floating around, it’s like accomplishing everything you want to do in life, travel, sail the world, whatever. What do you do after that? Basically there was nothing that was going to top that feeling, I had done it, there was a before and now I’m in the after. The Risers event was a once in a lifetime thing, literally you don’t get to be a Riser twice.

Sometimes the most exciting endeavors are the uncharted ones. You get to the top of the mountain, but there’s the way down to consider and all the paths that come up along the way. That’s probably a good way of phrasing it, a path that just pops up unexpectedly on the way back down. And my new exciting path appeared in the form of an email.

Because I was one of the five from my cohort selected for a talk, I’ve been asked to present my research at the Pentagon. There were six Riser events over the country for a total of ~180 Risers meaning there are about 30 of us that will have this chance and I’m happy to say I’m one of them! I’m not even sure I am supposed to announce it, after taking a quick writing break to google it to see if it’s even been announced, it doesn’t appear to have been!

And that’s basically the major update. I’m going to Pentagon’s DARPA demo days to present my research and hang out with top military officials who are interested in hearing about the stuff I’m doing. Well me and about 30 of my colleagues from different and/or same-ish fields. I didn’t even realize it was a thing until I got the email and once again it’s all cloak and dagger type stuff where I have no idea what all this entails, but it’s still pretty exciting.

I also should admit that it’s taken me a few weeks to write this post, but things have been incredibly busy. I am trying to get into a routine so I can blog on a more regular basis, but it’s been super busy. I’m going to try to write another post soon with all the updates, but I’m hoping by the end of next month I’ll have finished. I’m in the process of scheduling my defense and I’m currently ~54% done with my dissertation (assuming a 100 page final length).

More updates soon! But hey, DARPA… AGAIN!!!??? I’m still so pumped about that. Who would’ve thought?